Anarchism is today finally emerging out of its long held position as ‘the conscience of the workers’ movement’, as the eternal critic of Leninism and state centred politics.

It long took the side of the working class against the Party, a position Lenin mocked when he wrote: “The mere presentation of the question—"dictatorship of the party or dictatorship of the class(1); dictatorship (party) of the leaders, or dictatorship (party) of the masses?"—testifies to most incredibly and hopelessly muddled thinking....to contrast, in general, the dictatorship of the masses with a dictatorship of the leaders is ridiculously absurd, and stupid.”(2) Interestingly this was not written about anarchists, but rather about the position held by a Dutch-German Marxist tendency that was part of the Comintern. This tendency and others comprise what is known as ‘left-communism’. (Pic: Workers of Fiat in Italy take over the Factories )

November saw WSM public meetings about anarchism in Cork and Dublin, with 40 people at one and about 60 at the other. With the crisis and a growing employers’ offensive on wages there is a greater openness to radical ideas, and we will be holding more meetings around the country over the next couple of months.

Over 200 people packed into the Royal Dublin Hotel on Dublin’s O’Connell Street in early December for a public meeting on the topic ‘Democracy and Policing: How accountable are the gardaí to the Irish people?’ The meeting was addressed by

• Larry Wheelock whose brother Terence died in suspicious circumstances in Store Street Garda Station in Dublin over two years ago (see ‘Something Rotten in Store Street’ in WS99)

November saw WSM members gather for their national conference. These take place twice a year and all members can attend, submit motions and vote. The National Secretary reported that membership had increased by 25%. Although we are still a small organisation this was encouraging, as was the increased circulation of Workers Solidarity. A report is available at www. wsm.ie/story/3156.The closing weeks of 2007 saw WSM members who have been working with the Wheelock family’s campaign for an inquiry into the death of Terrence after his arrest by gardai from Dublin’s Store Street station help organise a public meeting, which saw 200 people fill the ballroom of the Royal Dublin Hotel.

After a month of fooling around, the government has finally declared that they will implement water charges for schools, backdating them to 2007. These charges come as a serious blow to Irish schools, which are already among the worst funded in the OECD. In many schools, funding does not cover basic requirements such as computers or gym equipment, forcing them to fundraise among parents of students.

Remember the good old days - before the election - when the Green party used to be in favour of the anti-war cause and used to support the searching of CIA ‘rendition’ planes passing through Shannon? Remember how the Greens used to believe that the reason why the then Fianna Fail/PD government wouldn’t sanction the searching of these planes was because they were in George W Bush’s pocket?

Union leaders, employers and the government will soon be sitting down to negotiate a new pay round as part of the Towards 2016 ‘partnership’ agreement. It doesn’t take a crystal ball to see that the bosses will be insisting on wage increases of no more than a few percent. They will troop into TV studios to tell us that anything better is – take your pick - impossible, irresponsible or unaffordable.

Porsche has given a bonus to its entire full-time staff. The 11,000 people who actually build cars got €5,200 each. The six person management board, none of whom has ever built a car, awarded themselves a whopping €113 million.

After almost three years of prisoner support activity by various
concerned individuals only, Anarchist Black Cross of Moscow was finally
reorganised as a functioning group last summer, as criminal persecutions
against anarchists in Russia reached their highest level in years.

Anarchists believe in equality between all people regardless of where their ancestors may be from, what colour their skin is, or where they were born, as we are all immigrants in one way or the other. Racism is often used by bosses as a tool in dividing the working class and weakening class unity, collective action and class struggle, because this threatens their privilege and authority.

The healthcare system, upon which people in Ireland depend, is an apartheid system. Simply put, some lives are worth more than others. Rare attempts at reform have been stymied by historic, chronic underspending and vested interests. This legacy has forced the vast majority of working people to take out private health insurance and has laid the foundations for a neo-liberal push towards an American-style system of private medicine.

Despite the “economic miracle” called the Celtic Tiger that has led to Ireland having a higher GNP per head of population than much of the rest of the EU, it lags behind in terms of health outcomes. At age 65 we have the lowest life expectancy in the EU for both men and women. Indeed, the gap between Irish and EU life expectancy has been widening. Infant mortality rates are above the EU average. We have above EU mortality rates for cancer and coronary heart disease. Despite Ireland’s incidence of breast cancer being among the lowest in Europe, the death rate in 2001 from breast cancer was the highest in EU15. To cap it all, we have a widening income gap, which analysis suggests will of itself worsen our health experience since greater inequality is associated with higher mortality rates.

HOPI s hosting a public meeting in Dublin with Torab Saleth. He's an Iranian socialist who took part in the revolution of 1979. In exile he became the editor of the journal 'Socialism and Revolution' and is currently on the editorial board of the journal Critique and a prominent member of Workers Left Unity Iran.

In early December classroom assistants in the North returned to work after a series of strike actions which had gone on since September. This action by the classroom assistants showed in stark form the two faces of the trade union movement. On the one hand there was the tremendous bravery and solidarity shown by the workers themselves in standing up to attempts to bully and harass them back to work. On the other hand was the duplicitousness and skulduggery of some trade union bureaucrats who not alone did their best to undermine the dispute but actively worked with management and politicians to betray the workers.

Christmas has increasingly become a matter of spending money on presents, rather than spending time with your loved ones. Where this might be hard for some, it can be financially unbearable for others. In order to meet the expectations from the society and avoid humiliation, we take up loans to get through family events such as Christmas.

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